THE 

I  PES  MOKE 
CARR-Y 


QH81 
T2 


LESTOH 
TAYLOR 


QUp  &  1L  Bill  ffitbrarg 

Nortlj  (Earoltna  8>tat? 
Imwraiig 


c^hsi 

T2 


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100M/1-77 


The 

PIPESMOKE 
CARRY 


h 


The 

PIPE  SMOKE 
CARRY 


By  BERT 
LESTON 
TAYLOR 


DECORATIONS 
Sy  C-B- FALLS 


CHICAGO 

THE  REILLY   AND 

BRITTON  COMPANY 

1912, 


Copyright,  1912 

by 

The  Reilly  &  Britton  Co. 


TO  TIFFANY  BLAKE 

You  too  have  come  the  forest  way 

That  wound  among  the  ancient  trees 

And  crossed  the  open  places  gay 

With  asters  bending  to  the  breeze ; 

And  light  the  burden  that  you  bore 
Along  the  frank  and  smiling  road 

That  led  you  to  the  lonely  shore 

Where  Rapture's  very  self  abode. 

You  too  have  known  the  many  moods 
Of  streams  that  babbled  as  they  ran 

Of  far,  unravished  solitudes 

Beneath  the  primal  spell  of  Pan; 

Have  halted,  reverent,  on  a  hill 

And  felt  what  speech  cannot  express  — 
The  "incommunicable  thrill" 

Of  unexpected  loveliness. 

You  too,  when  owls  were  on  the  wing, 
Have  wakened  in  the  windless  wood 

And  hearkened  to  the  murmuring 
Of  waters  under  leafy  hood; 

Have  heard  a  wakeful  sparrow  call, 

And  seen  the  bees  of  heaven  swarm, 

And  watched  the  waning  firelight  fall 
Upon  a  sleeping  comrade' s  form. 

B.  L.  T. 


rj^ELL  me  where  is  fancy  bred, 

Or  in  the  heart  or  in  the  head? 

How  begot,  how  nourished? 
Reply,  reply. 

It  is  engendered  in  the  eyes, 

With  gazing  fed;  and  fancy  dies 

In  the  cradle  where  it  lies. 

— The  Merchant  of  Venice 


Divine  in  hookahs,  glorious  in  a  pipe. 

'TpHERE  is  a  certain  brand  of  tobacco  that 
■**  is  burned  in  great  quantities  by  the  men 
of  the  wood.  The  name  of  it  need  not  be 
written  here,  since  it  is  known  to  those  who 
know  the  forest;  nor  need  its  qualities  as  a 
weed  be  brought  into  question.  As  to  this 
doctors  have  disagreed,  one  physician  main- 
taining it  to  be  the  best  tobacco  manufac- 
tured, another  holding  as  stoutly  that  it  is 
not  a  tobacco  at  all,  but  a  compound  of  great 
villainy.  My  opinion,  were  it  invited,  would 
strike  somewhere  'twixt  these  two. 

Odors  quicken  the  memory,  bring  up  swift- 
ly scenes  and  happenings  of  the  past.  The 
scent  of  wallflower  may  set  before  the  inward 
eye  an  old-fashioned  garden  and  a  white 
cottage  with  faded-green  blinds,  placed 
among  elms  and  maples.  Mignonette  may 
evoke  the  ghost  of  "an  old,  old  love,  long 
dead."  The  smoke  of  a  Havana  cigar  may 
recall  a  plaza  with  its  gay  throng  in  a  city  of 
the  Antilles.  Thus,  the  pungent  odor  of  that 
certain  tobacco  (the  name  of  which  Lord 
Byron,  had  he  striven  for  alliteration,  might 


mim 


Divine  in  hookahs,  glorious  in  a  pipe. 

^TpHERE  is  a  certain  brand  of  tobacco  that 
■*•  is  burned  in  great  quantities  by  the  men 
of  the  wood.  The  name  of  it  need  not  be 
written  here,  since  it  is  known  to  those  who 
know  the  forest;  nor  need  its  qualities  as  a 
weed  be  brought  into  question.  As  to  this 
doctors  have  disagreed,  one  physician  main- 
taining it  to  be  the  best  tobacco  manufac- 
tured, another  holding  as  stoutly  that  it  is 
not  a  tobacco  at  all,  but  a  compound  of  great 
villainy.  My  opinion,  were  it  invited,  would 
strike  somewhere  'twixt  these  two. 

Odors  quicken  the  memory,  bring  up  swift- 
ly scenes  and  happenings  of  the  past.  The 
scent  of  wallflower  may  set  before  the  inward 
eye  an  old-fashioned  garden  and  a  white 
cottage  with  faded-green  blinds,  placed 
among  elms  and  maples.  Mignonette  may 
evoke  the  ghost  of  "an  old,  old  love,  long 
dead."  The  smoke  of  a  Havana  cigar  may 
recall  a  plaza  with  its  gay  throng  in  a  city  of 
the  Antilles.  Thus,  the  pungent  odor  of  that 
certain  tobacco  (the  name  of  which  Lord 
Byron,  had  he  striven  for  alliteration,  might 


have  mentioned  in  the  verse  quoted)  has 
power  to  body  forth,  as  no  other  or  better 
tobacco  can,  the  pictures  in  the  Pipesmoke 
Carry. 

Home-bound  from  the  land  of  firs,  I  slip 
into  the  packsack  an  unbroken  package  of 
this  wonder-working  weed,  which,  set  alight 
on  winter  evenings,  pictures  more  truthfully 
than  the  camera  the  roads  of  summer.  Tree 
and  rock  and  falling  water  and  winging  fowl 
are  caught  and  prisoned  by  the  film  of  gela- 
tine, but  the  Spirit  of  the  Woodland,  dancing 
on  ahead  and  beckoning  to  a  still  fairer  pros- 
pect at  the  next  turn  of  the  road  or  bend  of 
the  stream,  eludes  the  camera's  eye.  So,  if 
you  are  a  lover  of  the  wild,  come  fill  a  pipe. 
The  tobacco  is  strong  and  housewives  vow  it 
is  unfragrant,  but  none  other  rings  such 
pleasing  pictures. 

And  while  you  smoke,  here  is  the  map  of  a 
country  you  will  delight  to  journey  in.  Take 
then  the  pack,  or  the  canoe  — either  is  less 
than  a  feather's  weight -and  let  us  set  for- 
ward into  the  green  mysteries. 


AND  the  Spring  comes  slowly  up  this  way. 

—  Christabel 


T  X  THEN  Summer  is  dead  and  the  stream 
*  *  is  mute,  and  the  snows  lie  deep  across 
the  trail,  or  when  the  False  Spring  pleasantly 
deludes  us  into  thinking  that  Winter  is  over 
and  gone  — one  has  only  to  fill  a  briar  bowl, 
and  wreathing  rings  disclose  the  Pipesmoke 
Carry,  which  flings  up-hill  from  the  lake-edge 
and  down-hill  to  the  marge  of  new  waters. 
Thistledown  is  not  less  ponderable  than 
canoe  and  pack,  nor  are  town  streets 
smoother  or  more  free  of  foot -snares  than 
this  phantom  trail. 

There  is  not  in  all  the  wilderness  a  fairer 
carry  than  the  Pipesmoke  one,  for  it  is  a  com- 
posite of  many  well -remembered  roads.  It 
winds  through  breathless  groves  where  "the 
pine  tree  drops  its  dead"  and  sun-drenched 
opens  where  the  choric  popples  sway  and 
sing,  through  cedar  swamp  and  alder  thicket 
(strangely  passable),  and  wild  meadowland 
whereon  the  dwarf  rose  grows.  Now  it 
breaks  through  the  brush  to  glimpse  the 
brawling  river,  and  now  it  halts  upon  a  hill- 
top for  a  long  look  into  the  Valley  of  Silence. 
And  all  along  the  way  are  flashes  of  fur  and 


feathers,  catches  of  bird  song,  a  scent  of 
twinflower,  an  endless  tinkle  of  brook  water. 

The  while  the  pipesmoke  wreaths  these 
pleasant  pictures,  one  may  tell  himself  that 
he  is  in  no  haste  for  riches  and  leisure  and 
freedom  to  range  the  forest  whenever  the 
gods  may  call;  the  forest  spell  is  not  some- 
thing that  passes  with  youth.  Age  modifies 
most  opinions,  one's  pleasure  in  this  or  that 
may  wane,  there  are  poets  and  music-makers 
of  our  youth  and  there  are  poets  and  music  - 
makers  of  our  later  years;  but  the  forest, 
like  a  certain  magic  melody  or  phrase,  is  for 
all  time  — never  less  wonderful  than  at  the 
moment  when  it  made  its  first  appeal. 

The  visions  which  the  Lady  Nicotine 
vouchsafes  to  me  contain  the  lyric  note, 
never  the  epic.  In  the  plexus  of  my  pipe- 
smoke  trails  there  are  no  towering  mountains, 
no  awesome  passes ;  the  few  hills  are  low  and 
fir-clad.  One  cannot  be  intimate  with  a 
mountain,  for  mountains  are  less  companion- 
able than  the  stars;  with  a  hill  it  is  different. 
Even  the  poets  have  not  been  drawn  to  close 
communion  with  the  peaks;  Byron  alone 
seems  to  have  exhibited  energy  in  mountain- 
eering. To  some  natures  the  mountains 
speak  as  nothing  else,  not  even  the  sea,  can 
speak ;  but  the  poets  for  the  most  part  have 
found  their  inspiration  in  the  murmuring 
wood,  the  running  brook,  the  wayside  flower, 
the  homely  countryside. 


yHE  South  sang  like  a  nightingale 
To  thaw  her  glittering  dream. 

— The  Young  Princess 


DEEP  as  the  sleep  of  the  Princess  Aurora, 
untroubled  as  her  gentle  slumbers,  that 
waited  but  the  wakening  kiss  of  Spring  and 
Love,  is  the  sleep  of  the  northern  woods.  We 
may  not  break  it  when  Spring  is  months 
away,  but  we  may  fill  again  a  briar  bowl,  and 
pipesmoke  wreaths  will  body  forth  dim  for- 
est aisles,  and  songful  coverts,  and  pleasant 
water  courses. 

There  is  one  pipesmoke  trail  which  memo- 
ry most  frequently  retraces ;  perhaps  because 
the  journey  was  unpremeditated,  because  so 
little  was  expected  and  so  much  returned.  I 
was  watching  two  woodlanders  loading  their 
packs  for  a  fortnight's  cruise  through  the 
green  places ;  ninety  pounds  to  the  pack,  and 
no  wrinkle  in  the  brown  canvas  — a  work- 
manlike job.  An  invitation  to  accompany 
them  as  far  as  their  first  camp  was  accepted. 
I  tossed  blankets  and  a  few  other  necessaries 
into  a  sack,  and  we  were  off.  That  was  a 
dozen  years  ago,  and  I  have  forgotten  the 
names  and  the  faces  of  my  companions,  but 
not  the  old  lumber  road  that  pitched  straight 


up  from  the  shore  of  the  Big  Water  to  the 
crest  of  the  ridge ;  the  singing  stream  on  the 
other  side,  along  the  bank  of  which  wound 
the  now  narrow  trail;  and  the  clearing  to 
which  we  came  at  sundown,  keen  for  supper 
and  a  pipe. 

In  this  open  place  stood  a  long-abandoned 
house  of  logs,  our  lodging  for  the  night,  and 
at  the  foot  of  the  clearing  the  little  river 
spread  into  a  pool,  every  detail  of  which 
memory  still  keeps  unblurred:  the  curve  of 
the  banks,  the  fallen  tree  beneath  which  lay 
the  larger  trout,  the  swaying  plant  where  the 
stream  narrowed  again  and  the  current 
quickened,  the  arching  alders,  and  the  back- 
ground of  firs  veiled  by  the  gathering  mists  of 
a  midsummer  night. 

"We  feel,"  Emerson  wrote,  "that  every 
one  of  those  remarkable  effects  in  landscape 
which  occasionally  catch  and  delight  the  eye, 
as  for  example  a  long  vista  in  woods,  trees  on 
the  shore  of  the  lake  coming  quite  down  to 
the  water,  a  long  reach  in  a  river,  a  double  or 
triple  row  of  uplands  or  mountains  seen  one 
over  the  other,  and  whatever  of  the  like  has 
affected  our  fancy,  must  be  the  rhetoric  of 
some  thought  not  yet  detached  for  the  con- 
scious intellect." 


^Y^HE  gauger  walked  with  willing  foot, 

And  aye  the  gauger  played  the  flute; 
And  what  should  Master  Gauger  play 
But  Over  the  Hills  and  Far  Away  ? 

Whene'er  I  buckle  on  my  pack 
And  foot  it  gaily  in  the  track, 

0  pleasant  gauger,  long  since  dead, 

1  hear  you  fluting  on  ahead. 

—  A  Song  of  the  Road 


^TOT  long  ago  I  happened  on  the  sugges- 
-*-^'  tion  that  "a  little  anthology  or  two  are 
indispensable  companions  for  one's  summer 
jaunts,"  and  it  was  formerly  my  practice, 
when  loading  a  pack,  to  slip  the  "Golden 
Treasury"  between  the  blanket  folds;  but 
I  found  — and  you  may  agree  — that  one  can- 
not be  confidential  with  his  favorite  poet  in 
such  a  large  and  varied  company;  a  thin 
volume  of  the  bard  beloved  may  prove  more 
profitable.  And  if  I  add  that  congruity 
should  be  preserved  it  is  because  of  a  scene 
that  rises  before  me  as  I  write  —  a  wild  shore 
on  the  sands  of  which  sprawls  an  over -stout 
friend  in  a  vividly-pink  shirt  bursting  at  the 
neck-band,  and  borrowed  trousers  several 
sizes  too  small  for  him.  He  is  reading 
"Pelleas  and  Melisande." 

Books  concerning  the  forest  are  better 
read  in  winter,  or  in  a  tardy  spring,  when 
the  longing  for  the  pack  and  the  trail  is 
sharpest.  Many  men  of  many  minds  have 
told  us  of  the  pleasure  in  the  pathless  soli- 
tudes. This  one  discloses  a  sentimental 
interest  in  wood  and  hill  and  cloud ;  that  one 


joys  in  matching  against  nature  his  own  un- 
conquerable soul,  in  taming  the  jungle  with 
an  axe;  a  third  is  a  brother  of  the  angle;  a 
fourth  a  poet.  I  am  but  a  Lantern  Bearer, 
moved  by  that  spirit  of  adventure  which  dis- 
covers itself  in  a  preference  for  fresh  woods 
over  old,  for  untrodden  ways  over  blazed 
trails,  for  distant  unwhipt  waters  over  rivers 
near  and  known. 

Stevenson,  in  an  essay  of  extraordinary 
charm,  has  symbolized  this  spirit  of  adven- 
ture in  a  group  of  lads  crouching  in  the  cold 
sand  of  the  links  "under  the  huge  windy 
hall  of  the  night  and  cheered  by  a  rich  steam 
of  toasting  tinware.  To  the  eye  of  the 
observer  they  are  wet  and  cold  and  drearily 
surrounded,  but  ask  themselves  and  they  are 
in  the  heaven  of  a  recondite  pleasure,  the 
ground  of  which  is  an  ill-smelling  lantern." 
To  one  who  has  not  the  secret  of  the  lanterns, 
he  says,  the  scene  upon  the  links  is  meaning- 
less. So  the  wilderness  wayfarer  will  find 
naught  but  toil  and  discomfort  on  the  trail 
unless  "deep  down  in  his  fool's  heart  he 
knows  he  has  a  bull's-eye  at  his  belt  and 
exults  and  sings  over  the  knowledge."  There- 
fore am  I  a  Lantern  Bearer,  stirred  by  the 
knowledge  of  a  bull's-eye  at  my  belt  and  of 
the  tune  the  Gauger  fluted  on  the  Road  to 
Anywhere. 


"O  UT  now  the  North  wind  ceases. 

The  warm  South-  West  awakes, 
The  heavens  are  out  in  fleeces, 
And  earth's  green  banner  shakes. 

— Tardy  Spring 


TJTOW  one  travels  on  the  Pipesmoke  trail ! 
"**  A  A  pinch  of  tobacco  will  take  me  twenty 
miles.  "Here,"  say  I  to  another  Lantern 
Bearer,  as  we  pore  over  the  chart  of  some 
wild  township, "  here  we  shall  be  by  nightfall; 
and  here"  — five  squares  away  — "by  late 
afternoon  of  the  following  day."  Five 
squares  —  pooh !  a  knight's  move  on  the  chess- 
board; we  may  do  even  better.  To  be  sure, 
there  is  no  trail,  but  we  travel  like  the  moose, 
stepping  lightly  over  windfalls  and  making 
no  account  of  cedar  jungle,  tamarack  bog,  or 
rushing  river.  My  maps  represent,  many  of 
them,  land  that  I  shall  never  set  foot  in,  but 
they  are  pin-pricked  with  pipesmoke  camps 
and  overrun  with  pipesmoke  trails.  And  the 
squares  holding  for  me  the  greatest  fascina- 
tion are  those  that  disclose  only  white  paper 
—  townships  unsurveyed,  uncharted  as  the 
perilous  seas  on  which  the  magic  casements 
open. 

At  one  side  of  a  blank  square  a  lake  leaves 
off  most  tantalizingly ;  at  another  side  a 
stream  emerges  from  nothingness ;  the  sources 
of  the  River  Alph  are  not  more  mysterious. 


I  recall  with  what  a  thrill  of  anticipation  I 
grasped  the  hand  of  a  timber  cruiser  who  had 
"looked  pine"  in  a  certain  unmapped  town- 
ship that  had  especially  fired  my  imagina- 
tion. He  was  a  rough  man,  he  swore  as 
terribly  as  the  English  army  in  Flanders,  and 
the  lantern  dangling  from  his  arm,  as  he 
leaned  against  a  frontier  bar,  was  not  sym- 
bolical of  a  recondite  pleasure,  but  a  light  to 
none  too  steady  feet.  But  this  man  had 
been  in  Sixty -two -six  —  or  whatever  the 
mystic  number  was  — and  in  my  eyes  he 
became,  therefore,  a  person  of  uncommon 
interest.  His  recollection  of  the  topography 
of  Sixty-two-six  was  disappointingly  hazy. 
There  was  perhaps  a  plateau  here  and  very 
likely  a  swamp  there,  this  stream  did  not 
amount  to  much  and  that  lake  was  a  "lone- 
some hole  "  —  what  did  it  matter  ?  Nothing, 
of  course  —  to  a  man  who  is  marking  pine  for 
destruction. 

Every  Lantern  Bearer  good  and  true  must 
be  a  lover  of  maps  and  share  the  passion  for 
atlas  voyaging.  And  I  am  sure  that  if  a 
good  chart  of  the  Narrow  Vale  were  to  be 
had  we  should,  when  the  summons  came, 
fare  forward  on  the  last  long  carry  with  a 
lighter  step  and  a  braver  heart. 


(~\H  tell  her,  swallow,  thou  that  knowest  each, 
That  bright  and  fierce  and  fickle  is  the  South, 
And  dark  and  true  and  tender  is  the  North. 

—  The  Princess 


f"  HAVE  never  experienced  a  desire  to  follow 
•*•  the  meridian  over  the  rim  of  the  southern 
horizon ;  the  wonders  of  the  tropics  make  no 
appeal  to  a  temperament  wholly  northern. 
In  imagination  I  may  have  journeyed  on  the 
Orinoco,  and  watched  the  Southern  Cross 
rise,  and  sauntered  in  the  plazas  of  Latin- 
American  cities;  but  I  have  never  asked 
first-hand  acquaintance  of  these  things. 
Polaris,  not  Acrux,  is  my  star;  a  white- 
throated  sparrow  singing  in  a  hazel  bush  is 
more  to  me  than  all  the  brilliant  birds  of 
Brazil,  a  patch  of  twinflower  dearer  than  the 
flora  of  the  Amazon.  So  I  follow  the  merid- 
ian north,  and  as  the  world  of  men  moves 
with  me,  each  year  will  likely  find  me  loading 
pack  or  canoe  in  a  fresh  outpost  of  civiliza- 
tion. 

The  picture  that  rises  now  is  a  long,  roof- 
less platform  marking  the  terminus  of  the 
railway,  a  straggle  of  wooden  houses  on  a 
treeless  hill,  the  inevitable  sawmill  and  the 
inevitable  saloon,  women  hanging  out 
clothes,  hulking  men-folk  lounging  in  the  sun, 
and  a  host  of  yellow-haired  children.   Yester- 


day  the  town  was  not;  to-day,  the  saloon- 
keeper, glowing  with  civic  pride,  calls  our 
attention  to  the  march  of  rough-shod  prog- 
ress. Where  the  ancient  wood  came  down 
to  the  water,  now  stands  a  mighty  sawmill; 
where  Pan  once  piped,  Bacchus  now  tends 
bar.  The  saloon-keeper  inquires  whether 
we  noticed  his  residence  on  our  way  to  the 
store;  it  was  the  one  with  the  red  roof. 
How  could  we  have  missed  so  notable  a 
habitation ! 

Midway  of  the  afternoon  we  are  ready  to 
depart.  The  canoes  are  dropped  into  the 
stream  and  the  cargoes  nicely  adjusted;  we 
push  out  among  the  lilypads,  and  steal  away 
as  silently  as  the  storied  sons  of  Araby,  and 
the  old  thrill  comes  with  the  first  dip  of  the 
paddle.  Our  camp  for  the  night  is  distant 
seven  miles,  but  we  need  not  hurry;  there  is 
no  wind,  the  smoke  of  the  sawmill  rises 
straight  as  the  stacks  that  belch  it,  the  waters 
are  still,  the  sky  is  free  of  cloud.  We  follow 
the  river  a  mile  or  so,  and  one  by  one  the 
splotches  of  frontier  civilization  drop  behind. 
Then  — the  open  lake,  the  north  rim  of  the 
world,  and  the  shining  Road  to  Anywhere. 


^HEN  follow  you,  wherever  hie 

The  traveling  mountains  of  the  sky, 
Or  let  the  streams  in  civil  mode 
Direct  your  choice  upon  a  road. 

For  one  and  all,  or  high  or  low, 
Will  lead  you  where  you  wish  to  go; 
And  one  and  all  go  night  and  day 
Over  the  hills  and  far  away! 

—  A  Song  of  the  Road 


Mil 


T^XCEPT  for  an  occasional  exclamation, as 
-*— '  the  panorama  of  solitude  unrolls,  there 
is  little  talk  during  the  first  hour  of  a  cruise. 
One  is  absorbed  in  " savoring  the  moment," 
as  Arnold  Bennett  would  say.  The  five 
senses  are  busy  transmitting  new-old  im- 
pressions, and  the  mind  is  occupied  in  record- 
ing them.  You  scan  the  sky  for  a  circling 
hawk  or  eagle,  the  while  your  ears  take  in  the 
loon's  alarum;  his  keen  vision  has  marked 
you  a  mile  and  more  away.  You  breathe 
long  columns  of  the  tonic  air,  and  dip  the 
paddle  deep  for  the  delight  of  feeling  the 
water  ripple  against  your  wrist.  Your  guide, 
too,  is  silent.  He  is  wondering  what  sort  of 
"  tourist"  you  may  be;  every  one  who  comes 
to  these  woods  merely  for  pleasure  is  a 
"tourist."  He  is  speculating  whether  you 
will  ask  more  of  him  than  he  purposes  to 
give;  whether  you  expect  him  to  be  a  wood- 
land Savarin;  and  whether  you  will  weary 
him  with  the  stock  questions.  And  you  per- 
mit him  to  speculate. 

Presently  my  pilot,  in  mid-lake,  trails  his 
paddle    and    inquires:   "By    the    way,    sir, 


where  might  we  be  going  ?  "  —  a  not  unnatural 
question.  I  answer  that  I  had  thought  of 
going  due  north,  but  that  it  doesn't  matter; 
all  roads  lead  to  camp. 

For  one  and  all,  or  high  or  low, 
Will  lead  you  where  you  wish  to  go. 

Certain  things  are  to  be  considered  —  the 
size  of  the  lakes,  the  condition  of  their  shores 
(forest  fires  have  left  broad  lanes  of  desola- 
tion), and  the  chance  of  head -winds  on  the 
home  trail.  Circumstances  alter  courses, 
and  have  since  earliest  days  of  navigation; 
so  circumstances  are  taken  account  of,  and 
we  decide  for  the  north-east. 

"He  travels  the  fastest  who  travels  alone" 
does  not  apply  to  literal  voyaging  through 
unfamiliar  territory.  If  one's  time  is  limited, 
a  guide  is  indispensable,  for  with  the  best  of 
maps  one  will  wander  from  the  course,  and 
the  camping  grounds  are  few  and  scant.  And 
with  the  best  of  maps,  again,  one  will  look 
long  for  the  fissures  in  the  green  walls  that 
round  these  loon-haunted  lakes  of  the  north- 
land.  One  swings  his  canoe  aloft  and  passes 
in,  and  the  green  gate  closes  after.  And 
whoso  would  follow  may  inquire  his  way  of 
the  kingfisher,  at  the  Sign  of  the  Sapless 
Bough. 


T^OR  oft,  when  on  my  couch  I  lie, 
In  vacant  or  in  pensive  mood, 

They  flash  upon  that  inward  eye 
Which  is  the  bliss  of  solitude; 

And  then  my  heart  with  pleasure  fills, 

And  dances  with  the  daffodils. 

—  Daffodils 


\K  7E  have  ploughed  a  straight  furrow 
*  *  through  Carp  Lake.  Its  ramparts  are 
so  cruelly  burned  that  the  usual  inclination 
to  paddle  close  to  the  shore  is  absent,  al- 
though once  we  turn  in  to  photograph  a 
huddle  of  burnt  birches  standing  by  the 
waterside.  When  we  come  to  the  north-east 
carry  we  find  it  green  with  young  woods  and 
tall  grasses,  but  it  is  disfigured  by  the  aban- 
doned shacks  of  a  mining  company,  the 
stark  ugliness  of  which  nature  is  doing  her 
best  to  modify.  Thus  we  are  in  the  best  of 
mind -states  to  appreciate  an  abrupt  reveal - 
ment  of  beauty,  and  such  a  revealment  is 
encountered  as  we  foot  the  trail  to  Emerald 
Lake. 

White  birches  and  asters,  in  a  marvelous 
profusion!  The  poet  who  could  not  but  be 
gay  in  the  jocund  company  of  a  host  of  golden 
daffodils,  could  not  but  be  tranquilly  joyful 
in  the  sweet  and  serious  company  of  this  host 
of  silver  birches.  So  thickly  set  are  the 
slender  boles,  I  know  the  camera  can  make 
nothing  of  them,  that  the  record  will  suggest 
a  bamboo  forest;  nor  can  it  give  a  better 


account  of  the  asters,  shoulder  high  and 
matching  the  birches  in  exuberance.  A 
shimmering  radiance  floods  the  grove,  in 
which  splendor  the  sun  has  less  share  than 
common,  for  its  direct  rays  fall  only  on  the 
tops  of  the  trees;  and  the  warm  air  is  fragrant 
with  the  breath  of  the  flowers.  Knowing 
the  camera's  limitations,  I  should  have  got 
out  my  notebook  and  had  a  try  with  words; 
but  making  notes  is  something  I  am  always 
going  to  do  and  never  doing,  trusting  instead 
to  memory,  which  seldom  preserves  details. 
A  rememberable  carry,  notwithstanding. 
The  snows  lie  thick  upon  it  now,  and  the 
leafless  masts  of  the  birches  cast  bluish 
shadows  across  a  whiteness  which  shames 
their  own.  Their  lovely  companions,  the 
asters,  are  withered  and  gone.  But  Spring 
will  pass  that  way  again,  and  following  in  her 
steps,  some  other  traveller  will  come  upon 
the  radiant  grove,  where,  standing  rapt  amid 
the  flowers,  he  may  thank  the  Creator  for 
the  gift  of  vision  and  for  the  inward  eye  that 
has  the  power  to  call  up  a  vanished  glory. 


f^H  fair  enough  are  sky  and  plain, 

^    But  I  know  fairer  far; 
Those  are  as  beautiful  again 
That  in  the  water  are; 

The  pools  and  rivers  wash  so  clean 
The  trees  and  clouds  and  air, 

The  like  on  earth  was  never  seen, 
And  oh  that  I  were  there. 

—  A  Shropshire  Lad 


H&H 


TNNOCENT  of  introspection,  with  none  of 
■**  the  Shropshire  Lad's  desire  to  "dive  and 
drown,"  Narcissus  gazed  into  the  silver  pool 
that  reflected  his  incomparable  countenance. 
He  was  an  extremely  comely  youth,  but  the 
.  mirror  flattered  him  a  bit,  as  it  flatters  every- 
thing in  nature.  You  have  coasted,  on  a 
windless  afternoon,  along  the  high  shore  of 
lake  or  river,  and  marked  how  clean  the 
water  washed  the  trees  and  clouds  and  air. 
Fair  enough  are  silver  birches,  mossy  ledges, 
and  bushes  bearing  scarlet  berries;  but 
"those  are  as  beautiful  again  that  in  the 
water  are." 

Sundown  on  Cypress  Lake.  A  lean  note- 
book mentions  merely  that  the  date  was 
August  18,  1911,  and  that  the  weather  was 
still;  but  one  does  not  forget  so  marvellous 
a  stillness.  The  last  zephyr  has  expired,  and 
nature  seems  not  even  to  breathe.  It  is  not 
the  calm  that  precedes  the  storm,  for  then 
nature  seems  uneasy,  and  the  lifeless  air  is 
charged  with  omens.  Now  a  luminous 
peace  envelops  the  woodland.  The  arches 
of  the  forest  aisles  are  motionless  as  those  of 


a  cathedral;  not  a  line  wavers.  The  glass 
of  the  lake  doubles  every  object,  from  the 
nearest  water  grasses  to  the  timbered  wall  of 
the  farther  shore.  An  islet  opposite  our 
camp,  with  its  sprinkle  of  firs  and  popples, 
becomes  as  beautiful  again.  A  school  of 
minnows  are  jumping,  a  spray  of  silver.  A 
gull,  high  enough  to  catch  the  sun,  sails  by  on 
lazy  wing;  its  double  sails  below.  A  loon 
calls  up  the  lake,  and  this  and  the  snapping 
of  our  camp-fire  are  the  only  sounds. 

No  less  mysterious  than  these  stillnesses 
are  the  first  moments  when  nature  wakens 
from  her  sleep.  The  popple  leaves,  first  to 
respond,  begin  to  quiver,  soon  to  dance;  the 
water  laps  against  the  shore;  the  clouds 
bestir  themselves,  and  like  a  fleet  that  has 
weighed  anchor  they  set  sail  for  other  scenes. 

Whereby  was  known  that  we  had  viewed 
The  union  of  our  earth  and  skies 
Renewed:  nor  less  alive  renewed 
Than  when  old  bards,  in  nature  wise, 
Conceived  pure  beautv  given  to  eves, 
And  with  undvingness  imbued. 


f~^OME  hither,  come  hither,  come  hither; 

Here  shall  he  see 

No  enemy 
But  winter  and  rough  weather. 

—  As  You  Like  It 


TX7IND-BOUND!  A  potent  phrase,  on 
"  "  the  sound  of  which  gather  in  the  mind's 
eye  an  odd  company  of  forest  adventurers. 
There  are  "tourists"  with  their  guides  and 
canoemen,  lumberjacks  on  their  way  to  this 
slaughtering  place  or  that,  Indians,  prospec- 
tors, camp  cooks,  and  tugmen,  an  English 
army  officer  who  has  exchanged  the  sword 
for  a  roll  of  maps  and  is  inspecting  his  majes- 
ty's woodland,  Canadian  rangers  — alert, 
good-tempered  fellows,  with  a  shrewd  eye  for 
contraband  —  east-bound  and  west -bound, 
they  are  gathered  on  a  neck  of  land  separat- 
ing Birch  Lake  from  Basswood,  waiting  the 
west  wind's  pleasure. 

And  chiefly  I  recall  our  camp-fire  after 
nightfall  on  the  lee  of  the  hill,  to  which  draws 
his  majesty's  First  Ranger  in  that  part  of  the 
Dominion,  a  tall  and  graceful  young  man,  to 
whose  pleasant  face  a  smile  comes  quickly. 
'Twixt  him  and  our  guide  there  is  much  talk 
of  maps  and  trails,  to  which  I  can  listen  by 
the  hour.  This  carry  (or  portage,  as  they 
call  it)  is  but  a  lift-out,  that  one  is  a  back- 
breaker;  if  one  go  by  Pine  Portage  he  shall 


see  fine  waters  and  woodland;  if  he  go  by 
Mud  Lake  he  shall  find  nothing  of  account. 
And  of  all  the  lakes  in  this  great  labyrinth 
there  is  none  like  to—  But  that  is  a  secret 
to  be  guarded,  for  as  yet  the  " tourists"  have 
not  found  their  way  thither,  and  next  sum- 
mer, or  the  summer  after,  it  shall  be  our 
destination. 

Summer  and  winter  these  rangers  are  on 
the  move,  in  canoe  or  on  snowshoes ;  and 
save  that  their  vocation  is  to  maintain  the 
law  instead  of  to  break  it,  their  lives  are  as 
romantic  as  those  of  the  bygone  archers  of 
Sherwood  Forest ;  or  so  it  seems  to  us  whose 
lives  are  spent  in  towns,  and  who  adventure 
into  the  wilderness  only  in  the  friendly  sea- 
son. We  hear  of  hardships  endured;  his 
majesty's  First  Ranger  is  reminded  of  the 
"longest  hike"  of  his  experience,  a  double- 
quick  from  a  certain  lake  to  Fort  Francis. 
This  draws  a  chuckle  from  our  guide.  "And 
I,"  vouchsafes  the  latter,  "was  just  one  day 
ahead  of  you." 

The  ranger  laughs  good-naturedly.  The 
feud,  whatever  it  may  have  been,  was  in  the 
day's  work,  and  is  now  forgotten.  The 
tobacco  is  passed,  and  the  embers  of  the 
camp-fire  stirred,  and  the  unwearied  west 
wind  whips  them  into  flame. 


N 


O  weather  is  ill 
If  the  wind  be  still, 

—  English  Proverb 


TO  be  able  to  sit  with  one's  back  against  a 
tree  and  wait,  a  week  if  must  be,  for  a 
drop  in  the  wind,  does  not  argue  possession 
of  a  special  kind  of  temperament,  for  I  have 
two  friends  that  are  unlike  as  can  be,  whose 
capacity  for  sitting  still  is  unlimited.  All 
that  either  asks  is  a  dry  corner  of  the  tent  and 
a  supply  of  tobacco,  and  the  North -East  may 
slant  a  deluge  or  the  South -West  crack  its 
cheeks.  My  patience  falls  short  of  theirs.  I 
can  wait  if  only  rain  delays;  but  a  wind  that 
blows  day  in  and  day  out  puts  me  on  edge, 
and  I  marvel  that  searchers  for  the  Southern 
Pole  could  face  a  ceaseless  gale  and  keep  their 
wits. 

Prisoners  of  "this  fierce  angel  of  the  air," 
on  the  lee  shore  of  Basswood  Lake,  we  turn 
in,  the  third  night,  to  the  shrill  music  of  his 
pipes,  but  in  the  darkest  hour  I  wake  to  find 
the  music  gone;  hushed  even  the  topmost 
choir  of  the  pines. 

Argent  Westward  glows  the  hunt, 
East  the  blush  about  to  climb. 

A  break  for  liberty  is  resolved  on.  The  tent 


is  struck,  breakfast  is  a  small  matter,  and 
before  our  fellow -prisoners  on  the  shore  have 
roused  themselves  we  are  speeding  west- 
ward as  fast  as  bending  blades  of  ash  can 
send  us.  But  in  one  stride  the  morning 
overtakes  us;  the  javelins  of  the  sun  shower 
all  around,  striking  fire  from  the  gray  rocks 
and  drawing  red  from  the  burnt  fir-tops  on 
the  nearer  shore;  the  mist -phantoms,  turned 
purple  by  the  pelting  sun-rays,  scurry  across 
the  face  of  the  waters.     The  day  is  up. 

From  what  quarter  may  we  expect  the 
wind  ?  We  have  not  long  to  speculate.  The 
West  is  announced  by  a  band  of  silver  far  up 
the  lake,  marking  its  first  contact  with  the 
plane.  The  silver  spreads,  ripples  grow  to 
waves,  and  before  another  mile  is  covered  the 
whitecaps  are  running.  We  keep  on,  spite  of 
aching  wrists  and  shoulders,  until  the  water 
begins  to  come  over  the  bow,  when  we  give 
up  the  tussle,  and  wonder  whether  we  can 
make  the  nearest  island  without  swamping. 
This  interesting  question  goes  unanswered, 
for  a  large  launch  has  come  up  behind  us. 
Distress  signals  are  promptly  responded  to, 
the  cargo  is  transferred,  and  from  our  "egg- 
shell pinnace"  we  step  aboard  what  seems, 
by  comparison,  an  ocean  liner. 


THIS  was  a  day  that  knew  not  age. 

— The  South-Wester 


A  SKY  without  a  trace  of  vapor,  a  sunlit 
***■  beach,  a  blue  plane  of  water,  roughened 
to  purple  where  the  puffy  off-shore  wind 
whips  it;  a  cluster  of  fishermen's  houses,  and 
back  of  these  the  forest.  In  this  memory 
picture  are  the  things  that  the  Spaniard 
Sorolla  delights  to  portray;  strong  sunlight, 
and  wind,  and  a  surface  joy  of  living.  The 
sunlight  is  everywhere;  it  floods  even  the 
forest,  exorcising  the  spell  of  it,  dissipating 
the  enchantment.  And  it  wraps,  in  a  blan- 
ket of  genial  warmth,  two  lotus-eaters  lazing 
by  the  waterside,  waiting  for  the  wind  to 
drop,  that  they  may  put  forth  in  their  cockle- 
shell. 

We  are  as  far  from  the  world  of  men  and 
affairs,  my  companion  and  I,  as  if  the  roll  of 
the  planet  had  pitched  us  off  into  space.  If 
we  prefer  a  planet's  shell  it  is  because  the 
beach  beneath  us  has  caught  and  stored  the 
rays  of  the  sun,  because  a  few  miles  of  atmos- 
phere has  colored  them,  because  the  wood- 
land has  yielded  its  odors  to  their  keeping. 
We  are  not  conscious  of  a  stronger  bond  with 
this  particular  footstool  of  the  Almighty.    It 


is  blazing  sunlight. w Thought,  introspection, 
shadow  and  mystery,  are  absent. 

But  the  voyage  at  "gathered  eve,"  the 
five-mile  paddle  along  the  shore  to  our  camp 
on  the  magic  Brule  — this  returns  us  to  the 
world  of  men,  of  the  makers  of  song,  the 
dreamers  of  shining  dreams.  Color  is  every- 
where; our  paddles  drip  it.  Araby  the 
Blest  never  harbored  odors  more  grateful 
than  those  the  land  breeze  brings  to  us.  As 
the  fires  of  the  sunset  pale,  a  song  sparrow 
sings,  slowly  and  plaintively,  two  measures 
of  an  exquisite  melody,  and  then  is  silent, 
though  we  wait  for  more  of  his  music.  The 
forest  is  dark ;  the  enchantment  has  returned. 
Shadow  and  mystery,  and  the  thoughts  that 
elude  expression  —  these  are  with  us  now. 
.  .  .  And  these  are  the  things  one  misses 
in  the  paintings  of  the  Spaniard. 


nnffE  great  brand 

Made  lightnings  in  the  splendour  of  the  moon. 
And  flashing  round  and  round,  and  whirr d 

in  an  arch, 
Shot  like  a  streamer  of  the  northern  morn, 
Seen  where  the  moving  isles  of  winter  shock 
By  night,  with  noises  of  the  Northern  Sea, 
So  flashed  and  fell  the  brand  Excalibur: 
But  ere  he  dipt  the  surface,  rose  an  arm 
Clothed  in  white  samite,  mystic,  wonderful, 
And  caught  him  by  the  hilt,  and  brandish 'd  him 
Three  times,  and  drew  him  under  in  the  mere. 
— The  Passing  of  Arthur 


■Ml 


IDLE  speculation  goes  very  well  with  pipe- 
smoking,  which  Schopenhauer  pronounced 
a  substitute  for  thought.  Supplied  with  this 
substitute,  I  have  speculated,  idly  enough, 
upon  what  sort  of  world  this  might  be  with- 
out the  printed,  painted  and  carven  products 
of  man's  imagination.  How  would  a  land- 
scape present  itself  devoid  of  every  fanciful, 
poetical  association  ?  Perhaps  as  the  meta- 
physical ''thing  in  itself,"  or  as  near  to  it 
as  we  could  come.  "Landscape,"  said 
Amiel,  "is  a  state  of  mind." 

German  metaphysics  suggests  a  tarn,  and 
this  poetical  word  recalls  a  moonlit  "state 
of  mind,"  in  which  I  and  another  found  our- 
selves one  midsummer  night  that  followed  a 
sundown  of  almost  supernatural  beauty. 
Our  camp  was  pitched,  and  is  now  pitched  in 
the  pipesmoke,  at  the  mouth  of  the  Brule, 
and  when,  supper  is  done  and  the  beds  laid 
we  venture,  the  moon  riding  high,  to  ex- 
plore the  river  —  silent  in  the  last  deep  reach 
of  its  journey,  but  songful  in  the  spreading 
shallows.  A  dozen  strokes  of  the  paddle 
bring  us  to  the  rapids,  lovely  in  the  silvery 


light,  and  we  digress  through  a  narrow  grassy- 
channel  into  a  circular  lagoon.  Thrice  we 
round  this,  then  lay  the  canoe  against  the 
rushes  and  sit  motionless. 

The  tarn,  or  more  strictly  lagoon,  is  walled 
by  the  forest,  and  it  pleases  us  to  fancy  it  of 
a  great  depth.  The  rim  of  it  is  all  in  shadow, 
with  a  pale  inner  ring  of  sagittaria;  the 
moon's  light,  thickened  by  a  mist,  falls  upon 
the  middle  of  the  pool.  It  was  from  such  a 
magic  mere  that  the  "arm  clothed  in  white 
samite"  rose,  bearing  the  brand  Excalibur. 
And  on  a  bridge  of  moonbeams  we  cross  the 
centuries  and  stand  with  Arthur  and  Merlin 
by  "  a  fair  water."   And  — 

"Lo,  said  Merlin,  ponder  is  the  sword  that  I 
spake  of.  What  damsel  is  that?  said  Arthur. 
That  is  the  Lady  of  the  Lake,  said  Merlin;  and 
within  that  lake  is  a  rock,  and  therein  is  as  fair 
a  place  as  any  on  earth  and  richly  beseen,  and 
this  damsel  will  come  to  thee  anon,  and  then 
speak  ye  fair  to  her,  and  she  will  give  thee  that 
sword." 

In  our  childhood  we  play  with  blocks,  and 
in  our  later  years  we  build  bridges  of  moon- 
beams. What  sort  of  world  would  it  be  with- 
out them  ? 


MY  eyes  make  pictures  when  they  are  shut. 

—  Day  Dream 


/^VER  the  desk  hangs  a  blueprint,  the 
^^  white  rectangles  representing  building 
lots;  several  of  these  spaces  are  marked 
"Sold."  One  has  only  to  express  approval 
of  this  lot  as  against  that  one,  and  the 
magic  word  "Sold"  is  written  across  it. 
No  money  changes  hands  —  none  that  I 
know  of.  I  remark  that  the  upper  lots  seem 
more  desirable  for  residential  purpose  than 
the  lower,  and  the  Judge  (as  they  call  him) 
becomes  alert.  He  draws  the  curtain  of 
his  desk,  locks  it  carefully,  and  rises.  "I 
have  a  little  surveying  to  do  up  there, 
anyway,"  he  says.  ''Glad  of  the  walk," 
say  I ;  and  we  set  forth,  the  Judge  carrying 
a  small  axe  and  tape,  and  a  stout  staff  which 
he  holds  before  him,  tapping  like  a  blind 
man. 

Our  way  follows  the  sweep  of  the  beach 
for  a  quarter  mile;  then  we  thread  a  fringe 
of  firs  and  strike  up  the  hill.  The  Judge 
pauses.  "These  are  the  lots  you  prefer," 
he  says.  "Ah,  yes.  And  what  do  you  call 
the  street?"  I  inquire,  looking  southward. 
"St.  Paul  Avenue,"  he  replies. 


I  fill  a  pipe  while  the  Judge  drives  a  few 
more  survey  stakes.  There  is  much  on  St. 
Paul  Avenue  to  admire.  The  thoroughfare 
is  gay  with  fireweed,  for  one  thing,  and  there 
are  asters,  and  the  red  and  purple  berries  of 
summer  flowers,  and  now  and  then  flashes 
of  feathers  and  trills  of  sparrow  song.  Un- 
disturbed by  our  presence  a  porcupine  is 
leisurely  stripping  the  leaves  from  a  fire- 
weed.  Below  to  the  east  lies  the  Big  Water, 
unruffled  as  a  forest  pool.  Two  crescents  of 
sand  define  the  shore,  and  between  the 
crescents  sprawls  the  village;  on  the  right 
the  frame  dwellings  of  the  Norse  fishermen, 
on  the  left  the  log  cabins  and  tepees  of  the 
Chippewas.  "I  shall  have  to  move  my 
office  up  here,  as  everything  down  there"  — 
the  Judge  waves  his  arm  — "will  be  wanted 
for  docks  and  warehouses." 

We  wind  down  the  hill.  "There's  a  boat 
up  to-night,"  I  say.  ''Would  you  mind  giv- 
ing this  letter  to  the  purser?"  He  accepts 
the  commission  almost  eagerly,  and  jots 
down  in  a  crowded  memorandum  book  a 
record  of  the  transaction.  The  Judge  always 
meets  the  boat.  North-bound  and  south- 
bound, it  puts  in  four  times  a  week;  and 
rain  or  clear,  fog  or  starlight,  the  Judge  is 
first  on  the  wharf,  staff  and  lantern  in 
hand.  "Somebody  on  the  boat  might  want 
to  see  me  about  a  lot,"  he  explains. 


0 


H,  don't  you  remember  sweet  Alice,  Ben  Bolt, 
Sweet  Alice  with  eyes  so  brown  ? 

—  Ben  Bolt 


TDIPESMOKE  through  pipesmoke.  The 
•*■  long  narrow  hotel  bar-room  is  fogged 
with  it.  Against  the  bar  lean  a  picturesque 
crew  of  lumberjacks,  timber  cruisers  and 
Indians,  waiting  for  the  night  boat.  A  tall 
woodlander,  with  lighted  lantern  dangling 
on  arm,  is  standing  treat  for  the  crowd,  and 
the  bar  is  awash  with  beer,  tall  beakers  of 
which  the  landlord  serves  with  a  careless 
hand.  In  the  corner  stands  a  music  box  of 
the  slot  variety;  the  revolving  disc  tinkles 
forth  the  pensive  ballad  of  "Ben  Bolt"; 
and  when  the  tune  ends,  Dave  the  Keeper 
of  the  Light  drops  in  another  coin,  and  the 
ballad  begins  again.  It  is  the  tune  he  likes 
best  in  all  the  world;  so  he  tells  a  French - 
Canadian  whom  he  has  persuaded  to  listen. 
"You  bet,  you  bet,  you  bet,"  says  Frenchy, 
sympathetically.  Both  are  bemused  with 
beer. 

I  have  been  talking  trails  and  rivers  with 
one  of  the  cruisers,  and  when  I  step  out  of 
the  fog  of  pipesmoke  for  a  breath  of  fresh 
air,  I  find  another  sort  of  fog  abroad.  It 
has  rolled  in  from  the  lake  in  great  volume 


and  swallowed  everything;  the  lighthouse 
light  is  obliterated.  The  door  opens  and 
one  of  the  woodlanders  comes  out,  followed 
by  a  tinkle  of  "Ben  Bolt,"  which  is  begin- 
ning another  round.  "There  ain't  no  music 
in  them  boxes,"  says  the  woodlander  scorn- 
fully. And  he  mentions  an  unknown  vio- 
linist who  passed  that  way  during  the  winter, 
and  to  whose  playing  he  listened  while  lying 
sick  upstairs  in  the  hotel .  ' '  That  was  music, ' ' 
says  he;  and  I  wonder  whether  it  was. 

Suddenly  through  the  fog  comes  a  ques- 
tioning blast  from  a  steamer's  whistle. 
"She's  out  pretty  well,"  I  remark.  "Ran 
by,"  says  the  woodlander.  "And  Dave 
ain't  got  his  bell  going !  Wonder  how  much 
longer  the  Cap'n  is  going  to  stand  for  that 
sort  of  thing."  He  opens  the  door  and  hails 
the  recreant  Keeper  of  the  Light.  "Hey, 
Dave!  Start  your  bell!  Boat's  outside  in 
the  fog  — pretty  nigh  the  reef,  too!"  Dave 
lurches  forth  and  vanishes  in  the  fog,  and 
presently  the  sound  of  oars  tells  that  he  is 
pulling  for  the  light. 

It  is  an  anxious  hour  for  the  folks  aboard 
the  steamer,  and  for  the  master  of  the  boat, 
who  fears  the  rocky,  lichen-frosted  shore. 
But  he  is  a  taciturn  man,  and  he  makes  only 
one  comment:  "Why  don't  Dave  hang  his 
fog  bell  on  the  saloon?  Then  I'll  know  where 
to  steer." 


"pv.4  Y  of  the  cloud  in  fleets  !    0  dag 

Of  wedded  white  and  blue,  that  sail 
Immingled,  with  a  footing  rag 
In  shadow  sandals  down  our  vale. 

— The  South-Wester 


■»ta*tf 


'"pHE  pipesmoke,  to  my  fancy,  now  takes 
***  the  form  of  clouds,  above  a  picture  of 
unbroken  solitude.  September  is  only  a  few 
days  old,  but  she  wears  the  vesture  of 
October.  The  fire-swept  slopes  of  Pine 
Mountain  are  clad  in  scarlet  and  gold,  and 
there  are  splashes  of  these  gay  colors  in 
the  pattern  of  the  circling  green.  Overhead, 
our  poet's  wedded  white  and  blue,  the  cloud 
in  fleets  — the  low-lying  stratus  streaming 
like  pennons  from  the  blackened  staffs  of 
dead  and  distant  trees. 

Here,  leaving  the  rude  wagon  road,  leads 
off  another  pipesmoke  carry;  pipesmoke 
truly,  for  path  or  blaze  there  is  none  — one 
steers  by  the  sun  and  the  "lay  of  the  land." 
Four  miles  of  ridges  and  ravines  lie  between 
me  and  the  high  burnt  hill,  by  the  farther 
slope  of  which  Atagi  of  the  Rembrandt  vis- 
age has  told  me  I  shall  find  the  magic  Brule. 
The  blessed  toil  of  those  four  generous 
miles !  Thickets  of  hazel  and  maple  belt  the 
hills,  and  tangles  of  alder  edge  the  small 
streams  that  drain  the  ravines;  and  to  the 
last  of  these  I  come  with  no  little  satis- 
faction.   A  brook  washes  the  base  of  the 


high  burnt  hill,  and  along  the  nearer  bank 
courses  a  well-worn  moose  trail.  This  pres- 
ently leaps  the  stream  and  pitches  up  the 
hill,  and  I  toil  after.  It  is  a  stiff  climb  for 
moose  or  man,  but  the  reward,  like  all 
rewards  worth  while,  is  at  the  summit. 

One  really  vibrates  but  once  to  the  shouts 
of  the  Valkyries  or  the  lovely  music  of  "Am 
stillen  Herd"  ;  successive  hearings  do  not 
bring  that  first  "incommunicable  thrill. " 
So,  from  this  hilltop,  I  shall  never  see  again 
precisely  what  I  see  this  day  of  wedded 
white  and  blue,  never  feel  again  the  lump  in 
throat  and  starting  tear  which  the  sudden 
revealment  of  exquisite  beauty  produces. 

Below  me  lies  the  Valley  of  the  Brule, 
a  perfect  picture  of  solitude,  transcending 
every  beauty  imaged  for  it.  Here  the  river 
widens  into  a  lake,  and  one  arm,  reaching  in 
parallel  with  the  stream,  forms  a  long  narrow 
peninsula,  in  the  swamp  of  which  a  few  dead 
trees  stand  weirdly.  Five  miles  to  the  west 
and  half  as  many  to  the  east  the  valley  is 
open  as  a  map;  and  where  the  river  is  in 
view  lies  the  roselight  of  the  afterglow. 

As  I  lean  my  pack  against  the  giant 
boulder  that  hangs  upon  the  brow  of  the  hill, 
and  look  long  into  the  Valley  of  Silence,  there 
comes  the  regret  the  lone  wayfarer  knows  — 
the  regret  that  another  is  not  there  to  share 
the  glory  of  the  place  and  murmur  an 
"Amen!"  to  his  fervent  "God  be  praised!  " 


/^vA^L  Y  at  gathered  eve  knew  we 
The  marvels  of  the  day. 

—  The  South-Wester 


*ja<£ 


SUNDOWN  and  striding  shadows.  An 
evening  of  rare  beauty  descends  on  the 
valley;  moonlight,  and  the  mist  rising  from 
the  river;  a  forest  as  enchanted  as  Undine's 
encircles  me.  The  ban  of  silence  that  the 
day  imposed  is  lifted  from  the  Brule,  which 
babbles  of  unravished  solitudes  and  mys- 
teries. Always  this  river  has  bewitched  me. 
Even  now,  seen  through  pipesmoke,  its 
charm  is  as  potent  as  on  that  blessed  morn- 
ing when  first  I  looked  on  it,  a  brown  flood 
flecked  with  the  foam  of  countless  falls  and 
rapids. 

Supper  and  the  pipe  contemplative,  and 
the  pleasant  recapitulation  of  the  obstacles 
surmounted  in  the  day's  work.  This  is  the 
chief  joy  of  a  woodland  voyage;  and  the 
harder  the  day,  the  deeper  the  peace  that 
broods  over  the  camp-fire.  One  would  not, 
indeed,  unless  the  need  were  urgent,  retrace 
some  arduous  trails;  but  before  the  cedar's 
blaze  their  thorns  are  forgiven  and  forgot, 
and  one  chooses  to  remember  only  the  cloud 
in  fleets,  the  autumn  finery  of  the  hills,  the 
flash  of  wings,  the  wayside  pool  and  flower. 


Into  the  weaving  of  this  gay  tapestry  some 
sober  threads  of  thought  may  come.  A  man 
may  reflect  that  his  life  is  made  up  of  many 
carries;  that  he  sets  out  with  a  brave  array 
of  companions,  who  fall  away  with  the  years ; 
and  that  middle  age  finds  him  footing  the 
trail  with  a  single  comrade,  sharing  with  her 
the  good  and  the  ill,  the  rough  and  the 
smooth,  the  sunlight  and  the  shadow,  the 
heat  of  the  day  and  the  cool  of  the  evening. 
Then,  if  heaven  be  so  unkind,  he  must  make 
the  last  and  longest  carry  alone.  Happy  the 
man  who  has  so  ordered  his  life  that  he  can 
go  this  solitary  way  serene  and  unafraid. 

Now  darkens  even  the  western  skyline. 
The  mists  rise  and  the  stars  show  in  the 
river.  I  am  glad  that  I  know  the  names  of 
many  of  these  stars.  The  tent -opening 
frames  the  Chair  of  Cassiopeia,  and  I  fall  to 
thinking  of 

That  starred  Ethiop  queen,  that  strove 

To  set  her  beauty's  praise  above 

The  sea-nymphs,  and  their  powers  offended. 

An  owl  hoots  across  the  lake,  a  muskrat 
splashes  in  the  river,  the  brook  brawls  under 
the  hill. 

All's  well  in  the  valley. 


nr^HE  wind  has  teeth,  the  wind  has  claws, 

All  the  wind's  wolves  through  woods  a  re  loose, 
The  wild  wind's  falconry  aloft. 

—  Hard  Weather 


n^HERE  are  pictures  that  bite  deep  in  the 
-*■  memory,  and  rise  long  afterward  with 
scarcely  a  line  expunged.  Such  a  picture 
the  pipesmoke  rings:  a  wet  wisp  of  a  tent 
swung  in  a  huddle  of  young  popples  against  a 
background  of  dead  jack-pines,  fire-killed 
and  waiting  for  the  wind.  Whenever  it 
blows  a  full  gale,  as  the  sailors  say,  I  see  that 
weird  array  of  blackened  masts  —  waiting  for 
the  wind. 

All  the  night  and  all  the  day  it  has  rained. 
The  woods  are  saturated,  every  leaf  is 
charged.  Globules  of  water  hang  from  the 
points  of  the  pine  needles,  and  the  young 
balsams  and  spruces  are  white  with  standing 
rain.  Rotted  trees  turn  to  muck  under- 
foot, while  overhead  the  forest  waits  but  a 
touch  to  discharge  a  deluge.  The  camp-fire 
burns  despite  the  downpour,  for  the  fuel  is 
jack-pine  and  the  flame  is  roofed. 

A  sudden  light  gleams  in  the  west  and 
broadens  till  the  blue  appears.  The  east 
begins  to  gild,  and  across  a  field  of  azure  the 
low,  thinned  clouds  drive  like  smoke ;  the 
South-Wester   shows   its   teeth   and   claws. 


Arcturus  burns  like  a  topaz  through  the  pop- 
ples, whose  slim  boles  bend  before  the  blasts, 
the  entire  grove  as  one  tree.  Have  we  not 
known  people  who  bow  their  heads  to  the 
gale  of  adversity,  nor  raise  them  till  the 
storm  is  past? 

Crash!  One  of  the  dead  trees  falls;  an- 
other, and  another.  I  can  hear  each  dis- 
charge of  the  tempest  as  it  comes  down  the 
narrow  valley.  It  sweeps  around  the  river 
bend,  preluded  by  the  boom  of  falling  trees, 
and  the  next  instant  it  is  about  my  ears, 
bending  the  popples,  scattering  the  fire- 
brands, and  dying  away  down  the  river. 
But  even  the  giant  wings  of  the  South- 
Wester  are  dusted  with  the  powders  of  Pop- 
py land,  and  my  last  memory  of  that  wild 
night  is  the  yellow  disc  of  the  rising  moon, 
glimpsed  through  the  storm-parted  portals 
of  my  canvas  lodging.  Safe  among  the 
bending  popples,  I  fall  asleep  to  the  rude 
music  of  dead  trees  falling  on  the  hill,  and 
the  deepening  voice  of  the  rushing  river. 


~\rOU  must  love  the  light  so  well 
"*■      That  no  darkness  will  seem  fell. 
Love  it  so  you  could  accost 
Fellowly  a  living  ghost. 
Whishf  the  phantom  wisps  away, 
Owns  him  smoke  to  cocks  of  day. 

—  The  Woods  of  Westermain 


THEY  tell  of  mariners  who  fought  with 
death  on  whom  fell  afterward  "the 
Fear,"  and  some  such  awe  of  the  forest  deep 
may  have  come  to  those  who,  within  its 
shadows,  have  been  at  grips  with  death  and 
all  but  lost  the  issue ;  for  there  are  accidents 
by  trail  and  river  which  must  be  reckoned 
on  when  we  put  forth  into  the  green  and 
blessed  silence,  and  that  is  one  of  several 
reasons  for  woodsmen  traveling  in  pairs. 
Nature  is  as  savage  as  she  is  beautiful;  we 
must  keep  the  upper  hand. 

The  woodland  has  always  used  me  kindly, 
and  such  fear  as  I  confess  to  is  as  foolish  as  a 
child's  dread  of  the  dark.  Too  much  imagi- 
nation is  at  bottom  of  it  — an  explanation 
offered  by  an  experienced  mountaineer,  who 
told  me  that  he  never  scaled  a  peak  without 
experiencing  acute  pangs  of  terror.  Imagi- 
nation it  may  be  —  or  a  too -lively  fancy,  which 
when  the  wind  is  in  the  fir-tops  peoples  with 
fantastic  shapes  the  "shadowed  leagues  of 
slumbering  sound,"  and  as  odd  a  company 
draw  up  to  the  edge  of  the  firelight  as  ever 
thrust    themselves    upon    the    temerarious 


youth,  in  the  Grimm  marchen,  who  set  out 
to  learn  what  fear  was.  Queer  folk  out  of 
the  pages  of  Hoffmann  are  among  the  visi- 
tors, and  there  runs  through  my  head  that 
old  tale  of  Fouque's,  and  the  river,  only  a 
pebble's-toss  away,  begins  to  rise.  It  cov- 
ers the  boulders,  it  creeps  up  the  bank,  it 
hisses  through  the  brush,  until  the  entire 
valley  heaves  with  frothy  waves,  milk-white 
in  the  moonshine.  I  hear  the  despairing 
cries  of  Bertalda  and  the  Knight,  and  see  the 
grinning  face  of  the  malicious  Kiihleborn. 

Then  I  rise,  with  a  little  shiver,  to  stir  the 
fire;  and  with  its  leaping  flames  the  flood 
subsides  and  the  wraiths  depart.  More 
surely  to  dismiss  them,  I  leave  the  circle  of 
firelight  and  go  down  to  the  river,  which  at 
a  place  that  I  shall  always  remember  runs 
still  and  deep  —  scarcely  "lapping  with  low 
sounds  by  the  shore."  The  moon,  an  hour 
risen,  stands  upon  a  fringe  of  pointed  firs; 
its  beams  define  a  sharp  bend  in  the  stream, 
beyond  which  sounds  faintly  the  murmur  of 
rapids.  The  peace  that  passes  understand- 
ing lies  upon  the  wild.  No  ghostly  train 
intrudes.    No  darkness  can  seem  fell. 


n^NE  sun  draws  out  of  hazel  lea  res 
A  smell  of  woodland  wine. 

I  wake  a  swarm  to  sudden  storm 
At  any  step's  advance. 

—  Outer  and  [nner 


MANIFOLD  are  nature's  moods,  as  seen 
in  the  turn  of  a  stream,  the  curve  of  a 
cataract,  the  banking  of  hills  at  a  lakehead ; 
—  and  one  may  not  anticipate  these  moods. 
One  may  view,  through  rings  of  pipesmoke, 
places  that  he  has  never  actually  seen,  and 
when  he  comes  to  visit  these  places  they  are 
not  in  the  least  as  fancy  pictured  them.  This 
is  a  common  experience,  but  it  is  not  so  com- 
mon to  find  reality  transcending  anticipa- 
tion. 

For  several  years  my  winter  meditations 
have  focused  on  the  confluence  of  the  River 
Brule  and  a  smaller  stream -a  fascinating 
point  on  the  map;  and  now,  after  a  week  of 
arduous  travel,  I  am  within  an  hour's  march 
of  the  goal.  There  remains  less  than  a  mile 
of  burnt  land,  but  this  is  strewn  with  hazel 
thickets -nature  in  one  of  her  most  trying 
moods.  Much  has  been  said  by  anglers  in 
depreciation  of  the  alder,  but  for  the  culti- 
vating of  patience  there  is  no  better  environ- 
ment than  a  thicket  of  hazel.  When  stung 
smartly  on  one  cheek  you  learn  to  turn  the 
other;  and  you  learn  to  disengage  yourself 


and  pack,  without  objurgation,  from  the  de- 
taining tentacles  of  a  plant  that  rivals  the 
devil-fish.  None  the  less,  you  have  a  defin- 
ite opinion  of  Corylus;  you  feel  that  you 
could  barely  be  civil  to  a  young  woman 
named  Hazel,  or  to  any  of  the  sex  with  hazel 
eyes.  Happily  the  sun  is  in  the  vineyard, 
making  woodland  wine,  and  the  air  would 
revive  a  Sisyphus.  Clearing  the  last  thicket 
I  enter  the  cool  wood  again,  and  presently 
come  to  the  climax  of  my  inland  voyage. 

The  picture  is  more  beautiful  than  that  I 
imaged  on  the  long  winter  evenings  when, 
map  in  hand,  I  footed  the  pipesmoke  trail. 
Where  the  filtered  tribute  of  the  little  river 
merges  with  the  clean  brown  of  the  Brule  is 
set  an  island,  rising  well  above  the  flood  and 
crowned  with  pointed  firs.  Curled  fallen 
leaves  of  birch  and  ash  inlay  the  surface  of 
the  stream  with  "patines  of  bright  gold." 
And  the  broad  pool  glitters  like  steel  in  the 
sunlight. 

Nature  now  in  one  of  her  most  romantic 
moods,  and  I  have  my  reward  for  many  days 
of  toil. 


O  WEET  as  Eden  is  the  air, 
^    And  Eden-sweet  the  ran. 
No  Paradise  is  lost  for  them 
Who  foot  by  branching  root  and  stem, 
And  lightly  with  the  woodland  share 
The  change  of  night  and  day. 

— Woodland  Peace 


^s$* 


WALT  WHITMAN  should  have  done 
the  Song  of  the  Pack ;  I  know  of  none 
to  do  it  now  — so  well.  We  have  minstrels 
who  will  sing  you  a  song  of  the  open  road, 
and  acceptably;  but  Whitman  would  have 
voiced  the  joy  of  toil,  the  joy  of  putting 
down  a  foot  and  feeling  a  weight  to  lift,  and 
the  deep  satisfaction  in  lifting  it ;  the  pleas- 
ure in  physical  fatigue,  in  thirst  and  sweat, 
and  the  clean  dirt  of  the  trail.  You  may 
fight  your  pack,  as  Sindbad  fought  the  Old 
Man  of  the  Sea,  and  fling  it  off  at  sundown 
with  a  great  sigh  of  deliverance,  but  you  will 
take  it  up  again  in  the  morning  without  a 
thought  of  travail  past;  and  when  the  new 
year  comes,  "reviving  old  desires,"  your 
shoulders  will  itch,  as  mine  itch  now,  for  the 
pull  of  the  leathern  bands. 

Now,  through  the  pipesmoke,  is  seen  a 
river  crossing;  a  simple  passage  when  the 
stream  is  low,  but  this  day  it  is  swollen  with 
many  rains,  and  races  shoulder  deep.  A  raft 
is  the  one  solution,  and  all  the  forenoon  is 
devoted  to  its  construction ;  slow  work  when 
one  has  to  fashion  wooden  spikes  and  rob 


the  spruce  for  thongs.  Not  a  dead  stick 
stands  among  the  green  for  rods  around ;  all 
that  offers  is  live  balsam,  and  when  the  work 
is  done  I  am  reminded  of  the  boat  that  Rob- 
inson Crusoe  built.  True,  I  can  launch  my 
craft,  but  there  is  so  little  buoyancy  in  the 
green  balsam  that  it  will  not  bear  both  man 
and  pack.  One  must  swim;  so  pushing  the 
precious  cargo  into  the  current,  I  follow  with 
the  motive  power,  and  save  for  a  few  collis- 
ions with  mid -stream  boulders  the  voyage  is 
accomplished  without  mishap. 

The  raft,  having  served  its  purpose,  is  dis- 
missed with  a  kick,  as  so  many  of  us  are 
dismissed  on  this  pleasantest  of  possible 
planets,  and  I  enter  the  brush  again.  I  had 
hoped  to  follow  the  Brule  to  its  mouth,  but 
I  have  made  slow  progress,  due  to  almost 
continuous  rain,  and  I  am  undecided  whether 
to  go  on  with  the  winding  river,  which  will 
mean  several  more  days  of  hard  travel,  or  to 
strike  south-west  across  the  more  open  coun- 
try to  the  shore  of  the  Big  Water.  A  patter 
of  raindrops  at  evening  decides  the  question. 

I  am  up  before  the  sun.  Breakfast  over 
and  the  tent  folded,  I  have  a  last  look  at  the 
magic  Brule;  then  the  compass  is  consulted 
and  S.W.  marked  by  a  dead  tree  on  the 
nearest  hill,  and  the  final  march  is  begun. 


TV  /YOSTL  Y  divinest  harmony, 

The  lyre,  the  dance.    We  could  believe. 
A  life  in  orb  and  brook  and  tree 
And  cloud:  and  still  holds  Memory 
A  morning  in  the  eyes  of  eve. 

—  The  South-Wester 


/TSHERE  yet  floats  a  ring  or  two  of  pipe- 
-*-  smoke,  through  which  is  visioned  forth 
as  long  a  trail  as  ever  I  footed  in  a  day's 
work,  or  likely  shall  again  —  a  trail  that  began 
in  the  mist  of  dawn  and  ended  in  the  dusk  of 
evening.  Twelve  miles,  as  the  crow  might 
do  it,  but  the  crow  carries  nothing  on  his 
back;  and  who  shall  measure  a  trail  where 
track  there  is  none  ?  Who  shall  take  account 
of  hill  and  gulley,  of  zigzags  where  the  best 
footing  lies,  of  swamps  and  thickets  circled, 
of  the  thousand  little  obstructions  in  a  road 
that's  run  by  compass  ? 

And  who  shall  take  account  of  the  thou- 
sand little  thrills  of  such  a  fling  through  the 
greenwood?  There  are  days,  like  sym- 
phonies, of  such  "heavenly  length"  that 
recollection  of  the  morning's  little  happen- 
ings is  dim  at  eventide ;  they  might  be  a  part 
of  yesterday.  So  many  are  these  little  hap- 
penings that  unless  one  has  gone  forth  with 
pencil  and  notebook  he  shall  not  recall  them 
singly;  they  are  the  notes  in  the  symphony. 
Yet  one  does  not  forget  the  certain  glory  of 
an  autumn  day.   The  eyes  of  evening  keep 


the  blue  of  morning's  sky,  and  I  march  with 
Memory  over  the  road  again,  through  the 
windless  wood,  over  the  burnt  hilltops,  and 
across  the  open  places  gay  with  fireweed  and 
asters.  I  linger  at  the  little  brook  where 
tea  was  brewed  and  luncheon  eaten.  What 
colors  there  were  in  the  sluggish  current 
beneath  the  arching  alders!  — browns  that 
shaded  from  fawn  to  the  deepest  tints  of 
Rembrandt's  palette,  with  milky  bars  of 
gray-green  that  seemed  to  swim  below  the 
surface.  How  fadeless  some  impressions 
are?    One  needs  no  written  record. 

And  the  coming  out  from  the  pathless 
woods,  at  sundown,  to  the  lonely  shore  of 
Kitchigami.  The  great  lake  lies,  a  rose- 
flushed  plane,  under  a  dome  of  rose  and  blue, 
and  over  the  headland  stands  one  large  star. 
A  flock  of  cedar  waxwings  flit  about  me 
unafraid,  and  six  loons,  like  stately  galleys, 
go  sailing  by  into  the  west.  Solitude  and 
silence,  yet  di vines t  harmony,  to  which  a 
sparrow  adds  a  rill  of  plaintive  song. 


yw\r>' 


North  Carolina  State  University  Libraries 

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PIPESMOKE  CARRY 


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